weevil

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. Any of numerous beetles, of the superfamily Curculionoidea, especially the snout beetle, that characteristically have a downward-curving snout and are destructive to nuts, fruits, stems, and roots.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. A snout-beetle; any coleopterous insect of the section Rhynchophora (which see). The term is more properly restricted to the long-snouted forms of the family Curculionidæ, but is also extended (beyond the Rhynchophora) to the family Bruchidæ. The weevils are almost exclusively plant-feeders; most of them live in nuts, grains, the Stems of plants, rolled-up leaves, catkins, or fruit, while others are leaf-miners, and a few live in gall-like excrescences on the stems or roots of plants. Brachytarsus contains the only carnivorous forms, and these are said to live on bark-lice. Some forms are sub-aquatic, as the water-weevil, Lissorhoptrus simplex. See phrases following, and cuts under Anthonomus, Balaninus, bean-weevil, Bruchus, Calandra, clover-weevil, Conotrachelus, diamond-beetle, Epicærus, pea-weevil, Pissodes, plum-gouger, Rhynchophora, and seed-weevil.
2. n. Any insect which damages stored grain, as the fly-weevil, a local name in the southern United States for the grain-moth, Gelechia cerealella. See grain-moth, 2.
3. n. The larva of the wheat-midge, Diplosis tritici. Also called red weevil.
4. n. Phytonomus punctatus, whose larvæ feed on the leaves of clover in Europe and the United States.
5. n. Sitones crinitus and S. flavescens, which feed upon the leaves of clover in Europe, their larvæ boring in the roots. The latter has been introduced into the United States.
6. n. Otiorhynchus sulcatus and O. picipes, which feed upon the leaves and shoots of the grape in Europe.
7. n. Rhynchites betuleti, a formidable grape-pest in Europe, which rolls the leaves of the vine.
8. n. Anthonomus musculus, the adult of which destroys the blossoms and flower-stalks of the strawberry in the eastern United States.

Wiktionary

1. n. Any of several small herbivorous beetles in the superfamily Curculionoidea. Many of them have a distinctive snout.
2. n. Any of several small herbivorous beetles in the family Curculionidae belonging to the superfamily Curculionoidea.
3. n. Any of several similar but more distantly related beetles such as the biscuit weevil.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. (Zoöl.) Any one of numerous species of snout beetles, or Rhynchophora, in which the head is elongated and usually curved downward. Many of the species are very injurious to cultivated plants. The larvæ of some of the species live in nuts, fruit, and grain by eating out the interior, as the plum weevil, or curculio, the nut weevils, and the grain weevil (see under plum, nut, and grain). The larvæ of other species bore under the bark and into the pith of trees and various other plants, as the pine weevils (see under pine). See also Pea weevil, Rice weevil, Seed weevil, under pea, rice, and seed.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. any of several families of mostly small beetles that feed on plants and plant products; especially snout beetles and seed beetles